Because I can’t.
He’s not mine and I don’t know what her business is here. I was so caught up in Cole’s story about losing his daughter, I never asked what happened to his wife. I just assumed. I assumed all sorts of things and never confirmed any of them. I just noted that he was alone. Solitary. That he wore no wedding ring and had no connections. And I let the rest go.
Like a stupid child.
I wanted to trust blindly. And so I did.
“Maybe we could go inside?” she asks, shivering noticeably. Her clothes may look nice and probably cost a fortune, but they obviously aren’t very weather-worthy. I want to smirk. I want to tell her to go back to wherever she came from.
But I don’t.
Because, again, I can’t. I have to know. No matter how much it hurts.
“Of course.”
I lead her inside, setting the last of the groceries in the kitchen. “Have a seat,” I tell her as I busy myself getting Emmy situated in her room with a brand new sketch pad and colored pencils for her to draw with. When I return, Brooke isn’t seated, but rather staring out the kitchen window. Toward the house Cole has been working on.
My heart drops into my stomach.
I clear my throat and begin to sift through a bag, pulling out cold items and placing them in the refrigerator. I’m not going to make any overtures. I’ll wait for her to get to the point.
“How long have you known Cole?” she asks finally. She turns toward me. I can tell because of the clarity of her voice, but also because the hair on my arms stands up. Like they’re reacting to her scrutiny.
“Just a few months.”
“How is he?”
I shrug, taking the milk out of a bag and setting it carefully in the fridge. “He’s fine, I guess. I didn’t know him before, so…”
“Right,” is all she says. After a couple of minutes, during which my nerves are about to make my skin bleed, she continues. “Did he tell you about…everything?”
“What’s everything?”
“Charity, the accident. Everything that happened.”
“He told me that she was killed in a car accident. And that he was driving.”
“Did he tell you he’d been drinking?”
I turn and meet her eyes. They’re a beautiful lime green color. Stunning, like the rest of her. “Yes, he did.”
She nods and looks down at the kitchen table. I turn to put cheese on the shelf. “And did he tell you about us?”
My hand freezes on the cheese. Just for a few seconds. “Some.”
“Did he tell you we’re still married?”
“No,” I manage to whisper, even though my heart is in my throat.
Her laugh is bitter. “I’m not surprised.”
“And why is that?”
“He’s cheated on me more times than I can count.”
I feel like I’ve been kicked in the chest by someone wearing razor-sharp stilettos.
“I’m sorry to hear that.” What else am I supposed to say?
“I’ve only seen him a handful of times since…since the accident. He just lost it. We both did, I guess. Losing a child…”
I close my eyes and I push the refrigerator door shut. I don’t even bother turning to face her. I don’t want to see the pain. I can already imagine what it must look like–a mother’s face when she talks about the child she lost.
“I couldn’t stand to come back here. He couldn’t stay away. We just sort of silently agreed to heal however we could, wherever we could. But I never stopped loving him. And I think we’re both ready to try again. When I talked to him last week–”
“Last week?” I interrupt, my stomach twisting into a bundle of knots.
“Yes. We’ve kept in touch, of course. I wanted to make sure he was okay. He’s never wanted me to come here, to visit him here, but it’s Christmas. And I hate the thought of him spending another Christmas alone, so I thought I’d surprise him.”
Oh, he’ll be surprised, alright.
Or will he? Is this why he started pulling away? Did it really have anything to do with getting too close to us? Or did he think he was on the verge of getting busted?
The thought makes the room dip and sway behind my closed lids.
“Maybe I shouldn’t assume that there’s something between you, but if there is, I want you to know that I’m not trying to hurt you. Cole is a gorgeous, charismatic man. A woman would have to be blind not to see that. But we have a lot of history together.”
I nod, trying hard to swallow past the lump in my throat. “I completely understand.”
“I was hoping you would.” I hear the tread of her soft-soled shoes as she walks toward the living room. I collect myself and smile as I turn toward her. “It was…it was nice meeting you, Eden. I wish you the best of luck.”
“You, too,” I say as sincerely as I can. And for the most part I mean it. This woman has lost enough. I won’t stand in the way of her attempts to salvage her marriage. Now that I know that there is one.
“I’ll see myself out.”
I wait until I hear her engine start before I go to Emmy’s room. She’s drawing a turtle, a pretty good one actually. I plaster a bright, excited smile on my face. “Hey, you wanna go do some Christmas shopping in Ashbrook today?”
I have to get out of here. I have to be somewhere that I can’t sit and think, that I can’t see Cole and his wife from my window. I don’t need that visual to add to my torture.
“Yeah!” she exclaims, hopping off her bed and racing for the door.
“Coat, young lady.”
She runs with a boot in one hand to get her coat from the hall closet and then runs back to finish putting it on. I fight back tears as I remind myself that Emmy and I have done just fine by ourselves these last two years. We’ll be just fine for the next two, as well. And the two after that, and the two after that.
That’s my mantra all the way to Ashbrook and all the way home three hours later.
????
I’ve been lying in bed, awake, in the dark, for hours. I didn’t want Cole to see lights on if he should happen to pass by. If he should happen to care.
I figure he does. He’ll feel guilty most likely. Try to explain so that I won’t hate him. That would bother him, I think. Of course, what the hell do I know? It seems that I know very little about the man after all. I keep getting revelation after revelation, very few of them good ones.
And yet, I still love him. I do. In fact, except for this last bomb, I think his brokenness may have made me love him even more. If there’s one thing I can relate to, it’s brokenness. I’ve seen it. I’ve felt it. I’ve lived it. It’s been my constant companion for as long as I can remember. And I didn’t think it could get any worse.
I was wrong.